| Dodece said: I do not see Microsoft at fault here, and more to the point I do not see the argument that justifies the need for having multiple operating systems. The more systems there are the less fluent users will be, and the more technical problems will arise. The blanket statement that competition is good is not always the truth. Some markets need a standard barer, and you need not look any further then for example the railroad industry. The industry functions, because a few large companies established standards such as gauge. Thanks to that trains could be made to a uniform design. Trains could transit large distances. Plus the standardization allowed for real price reductions and efficiency. So there are advantages. The problem for these companies isn't just that they are smaller or less well known. The problem is that they haven't developed a vastly superior or different product. |
I see your point, but what you're really calling for is interoperability - that programs can be portable between OSs. This is possible without using one OS. MS has consistently been against portability by making its APIs (e.g. DirectX, .NET) closed and tied to MS platforms. It's very easy to port Linux apps to Windows - just recompile with one button press. The reverse takes years due to MS's tactics.
Also, interface consistency is achieveable withoout using one system via the use of standards. Linux is fragmented... but most apps look the same and are usable in the same way consistently due to adherence to voluntary standards. You'd think MS would be at an advantage here since the platform is under the control of one company - but even MS's own apps have contradictory behaviours. Buttons and functions look and behave differently between Office, IE, Windows Media Player, Movie Maker, Outlook, the Taskbar, the Control Panel... it's a usability mess. This is why OpenOffice is an easier upgrade than Office 2003 -> 2007 - it sticks close to what people know.
Also, running everything on one closed system puts you at the mercy of that company. Why is it a single virus or trojan can take over millions of computers at once and take months to recover? Why was the Y2K bug so big and cause billions of dollars of spending to fix it? It's because we ALL run MS. The day that the Big One of vulnerabilities is discovered then 95% of the world's PCs will go down.
